peace, rather than war. Their occupa- tent, and admonishes him, by these tion was to teach diseased barbarians, messengers, to a more pleasant exercise who despised them, and thought it no of his authority. That such severe small favour that they should be per- punishments should not confer a more mitted to exist in their neighbourhood. powerful authority, and give birth to a They had to witness the cruelties of better discipline, is less extraordinary, despotism, and the passions of armed if we reflect, that we hear only that the and ignorant multitudes; and all this punishments are severe, not that they embellished with the fair probability of are steady, and that they are just; for being swept off, in some grand en- if the Turkish soldiers were always gagement, by the superior tactics and punished with the same severity when activity of the enemy to whom the they were in fault, and never but then, Turks were opposed. To the filth, it is not in human nature to suppose irregularity, and tumult of a Turkish that the Turkish army would long camp, as it appeared to the British remain in as contemptible a state as it officers in 1800, it is curious to oppose now is. But the governed soon learn the picture of one drawn by Busbequius to distinguish between systematic in the middle of the sixteenth century: energy and the excesses of casual and "Turcæ in proximis campis tendebant; capricious cruelty; the one awes them cum vero in eo loco tribus mensibus into submission, the other rouses them vixerim, fuit mihi facultas videndorum | to revenge. ipsorum castrorum, et cognoscendæ Dr. Wittman, in his chapter on the aliqua ex parte disciplinæ; qua de re Turkish army, attributes much of its nisi pauca attingam, habeas fortasse degradation to the altered state of the quod me accuses. Sumpto habitu corps of Janissaries; the original conChristianis hominibus in illis locis stitution of which corps was certainly usitato, cum uno aut altero comite qua- both curious and wise. The children cunque vagabar ignotus: primum of Christians made prisoners in the videbam summo ordine cujusque cor- predatory incursions of the Turks, or poris milites suis locis distributos, et, procured in any other manner, were quod vix credat, qui nostratis militiæ exposed in the public markets at Conconsuetudinem novit, summum erat stantinople. Any farmer or artificer ubique silentium, summa quies, rixa was at liberty to take one into his sernulla, nullum cujusquam insolens fac-vice, contracting with government to tam: sed ne nox quidem aut vitulatio per lasciviam aut ebrietatem emissa. Ad hæc summa mundities, nulla sterquilinia, nulla purgamenta, nihil quod oculos aut nares offenderet. Quicquid est hujusmodi, aut defodiunt Turcæ, aut procul à conspectu submovent. Sed nec ullas compotationes aut convivia, nullum alex genus, magnum nostratis militiæ flagitium, videre erat: nulla lasoriarium chartarum, neque tesserarum damna norunt Turcæ."Augeri Busbequii, Epist. 3. p. 187. Hanovic, 1622. There is at present, in the Turkish army, a curious mixture of the severest despotism in the commander, and the most rebellious insolence in the soldier. When the soldier misbehaves, the Vizier cuts his head off, and places it under his arm. When the soldier is dissatisfied with the Vizier, he fires his ball through his

produce him again when he should be wanted; and in the meantime to feed and clothe him, and to educate him to such works of labour as are calculated to strengthen the body. As the Janissaries were killed off, the government drew upon this stock of hardy orphans for its levies; who, instead of hanging upon weeping parents at their departure, came eagerly to the camp, as the situation which they had always been taught to look upon as the theatre of their future glory, and towards which all their passions and affections had been bent, from their earliest years. Arrived at the camp, they received at first low pay, and performed menial offices for the little division of Janissaries to which they were attached: “Ad Gianizaros rescriptus primo meret menstruo stipendio, paulo plus minus, unius ducati cum dimidio. Id enim militi

novitio, et rudi satis esse censent. Sed and regiments in the European fashion,

tamen ne quid victus necessitati desit, and would, if he were well seconded, cum ea decuria, in cujus contubernium bring about some important reforms in adscitus est, gratis cibum capit, eâ con- the Turkish empire. But what has ditione, ut in culinâ reliquoque minis- become of all the reforms of the famous terio ei decuriæ serviat; usum armorum Gazi Hassan ? The blaze of partial adeptus tyro, necdum tamen suis con- talents is soon extinguished. Never tubernalibus honore neque stipendio was there so great a prospect of impar, unam in solâ virtute, se illis æquan- provement as that afforded by the exdi, spem habet: utpote si militiæ quæ ertions of this celebrated man, who, in prima se obtulerit, tale specimen sui spite of the ridicule thrown upon him dederit, ut dignus judicetur, qui tyro- by Baron de Tott, was such a man as cinio exemptus, honoris gradu et sti- the Turks cannot expect to see again pendii magnitudine, reliquis Gianizaris once in a century. He had the whole par habeatur. Quâ quidem spe plerique power of the Turkish empire at his tyrones impulsi, multa præclare audent, disposal for fifteen years; and, after et fortitudine cum veteranis certant." repeated efforts to improve the army, -Busbequius, De Re Mil. cont. Turc. abandoned the scheme as totally imInstit. Consilium.* The same author practicable. The celebrated Bonneval, observes, that there was no rank or in his time, and De Tott since, made dignity in the Turkish army to which the same attempt with the same suca common Janissary might not arrive cess. They are not to be taught; and by his courage or his capacity. This last is a most powerful motive to exertion, and is perhaps one leading cause of the superiority of the French arms. Ancient governments promote, from numberless causes, which ought to have no concern with promotion: revolutionary governments, and military despotisms, can make generals of persons who are fit for generals: to enable them to be unjust in all other instances, they are forced to be just in this. What, in fact, are the sultans and pachas of Paris, but Janissaries raised from the ranks? At present, the Janissaries are procured from the lowest of the people, and the spirit of the corps is evaporated. The low state of their armies is in some degree imputable to this: but the principle reason why the Turks are no longer as powerful as they were is, that they are no longer enthusiasts, and that war is now become more a business of science than of personal courage.

The person of the greatest abilities in the Turkish empire is the Capitan Pacha. He has disciplined some ships

This is a very spirited appeal to his countrymen on the tremendous power of the Turks; and, with the substitution of France for Turkey, is so applicable to the present times, that it might be spoken in parliament with great effect.

six months after his death, everything the present Capitan Pacha has done will be immediately pulled to pieces. The present Grand Vizier is a man of no ability. There are some very entertaining instances of his gross ignorance cited in the 133d page of the Travels. Upon the news being communicated to him that the earth was round, he observed that this could not be the case; for the people and the objects on the other side would in that case fall off; and that the earth could not move round the sun; for if so, a ship bound from Jaffa to Constantinople, instead of proceeding to the capital would be carried to London, or elsewhere. We cannot end this article without confessing with great pleasure the entertainment we have received from the work which occasions it. It is an excellent lounging-book, full of pleasant details, never wearying by prolixity, or offending by presumption, and is apparently the production of a respectable, worthy man. So far we can conscientiously recommend it to the public; for anything else,

Non cuivis homini contingit adire, &c. &c. &c.

EDGEWORTH ON BULLS.

(E. REVIEW, 1803.)

Essary on Irish Bulls. By Richard Lovell Edgeworth, and Maria Edgeworth. London, 1802.

balm beyond the precincts of Gilead. If nothing can be said to exist preeminently and emphatically in one country, which exists at all in another, then Frenchmen are not gay, nor Spaniards grave, nor are gentlemen of the Milesian race remarkable for their WE hardly know what to say about disinterested contempt of wealth in this rambling scrambling book; but their connubial relations. It is prothat we are quite sure the author, when bable there is some foundation for a he began any sentence in it, had not the character so generally diffused; though smallest suspicion of what it was about it is also probable that such foundation to contain. We say the author, be- is extremely enlarged by fame. If cause, in spite of the mixture of sexes there were no foundation for the in the title page, we are strongly in-common opinion, we must suppose clined to suspect that the male contri-national characters formed by chance; butions exceed the female in a very and that the Irish might, by accident, great degree. The Essay on Bulls have been laughed at as bashful and is written much with the same mind, sheepish; which is impossible. The and in the same manner, as a school- author puzzles himself a good deal boy takes a walk: he moves on for about the nature of bulls, without ten yards on the straight road, with coming to any decision about the surprising perseverance; then sets out matter. Though the question is not a after a butterfly, looks for a bird's nest, very easy one, we shall venture to say, or jumps backwards and forwards over that a bull is an apparent congruity, a ditch. In the same manner, this and real incongruity of ideas, suddenly nimble and digressive gentleman is discovered. And if this account of away after every object which crosses bulls be just, they are (as might have his mind. If you leave him at the been supposed) the very reverse of wit; end of a comma, in a steady pursuit for as wit discovers real relations, that of his subject, you are sure to find are not apparent, bulls admit apparent him, before the next full stop, a hundred relations that are not real. The pleasure yards to the right or left, frisking, arising from wit proceeds from our capering, and grinning in a high pa- surprise at suddenly discovering two roxysm of merriment and agility. Mr. things to be similar, in which we susEdgeworth seems to possess the senti- pected no similarity. The pleasure ments of an accomplished gentleman, arising from bulls proceeds from our the information of a scholar, and the discovering two things to be dissimilar, vivacity of a first-rate harlequin. He in which a resemblance might have is fuddled with animal spirits, giddy been suspected. The same doctrine with constitutional joy; in such a state will apply to wit, and to bulls in he must have written on, or burst. A action. Practical wit discovers condischarge of ink was an evacuation nection or relation between actions, in absolutely necessary, to avoid fatal and plethoric congestion.

which duller understandings discover none; and practical bulls originate from an apparent relation between two actions, which more correct understandings immediately perceive to have no relation at all.

The object of the book is to prove, that the practice of making bulls is not more imputable to the Irish than to any other people; and the manner in which he sets about it, is to quote ex- Louis XIV., being extremely haamples of bulls produced in other rassed by the repeated solicitations of countries. But this is surely a singular a veteran officer for promotion, said way of reasoning the question: for one day, loud enough to be heard, there are goitres out of the Valais," That gentleman is the most troubleextortioners who do not worship Moses, some officer I have in my service.' oat cakes south of the Tweed, and "That is precisely the charge (said

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66

A patient in

the sagacity of multitudes than we do, I throw the person rubbed into a very who would convert this into a reason copious perspiration. of belief. Whoever thinks it so easy typhus, who was given over, recovered to get at truth in the midst of passion, after this discipline was administered. The boldness and enterprise of should read the various histories of the recent rebellion in Ireland; or he may, medical men is quite as striking as the if he chooses, believe, with thousands courage displayed in battle, and evinces of worthy Frenchmen, that the infernale how much the power of encountering was planned by Mr. Pitt and Lord danger depends upon habit. Many a Melville. As for us, we will state what military veteran would tremble to feed appears to us to be the truth, should it upon pus; to sleep in sheets running even chance to justify a man in whose with water; or to draw up the breath lifetime Europe can know neither hap- of feverish patients. Dr. White might' not, perhaps, have marched up to a piness nor peace. The story of the poisoning is given battery with great alacrity; but Dr. by Dr. Wittman precisely in the same White, in the year 1801, inoculated desultory manner as that of the mas- himself in the arms, with recent matter sacre. "An individual was pointed out taken from the bubo of a pestiferous to us as the executioner of these diaboli-patient, and rubbed the same matter cal commands." By how many persons upon different parts of his body. was he pointed out as the executioner? With somewhat less of courage, and by persons of what authority? and of what credibility? Was it asserted from personal knowledge, or merely from rumour? Whence comes it that such an agent, after the flight of his employer, was not driven away by the general indignation of the army? If Dr. Wittman had combined this species of information with his stories, his conduct would have been more just, and his accusations would have carried greater weight. At present, when he, who had the opportunity of telling us so much, has told us so little, we are rather less inclined to believe than we were before. We do not say, these accusations are not true, but that Dr. Wittman has not proved them to be

true.

Dr. Wittman did not see more than two cases of plague: he has given them both at full length. The symptoms were thirst, headache, vertigo, pains in the limbs, bilious vomitings, and painful tumours in the groins. The means of cure adopted were, to evacuate the primæ viæ; to give diluting and refreshing drinks; to expel the redundant bile by emetics; and to assuage the pain in the groin by fomentations and anodynes; both cases proved fatal. In one of the cases, the friction with warm oil was tried in vain; but it was thought useful in the prevention of plague: the immediate effect produced was, to

more of injustice, he wrapt his Arab servant in the bed of a person just dead of the plague. The Doctor died; and the Doctor's man (perhaps to prove his master's theory, that the plague was not contagious) ran away.

The bravery of our naval officers never produced anything superior to this therapeutic heroism of the Doctor's.

Dr. Wittman has a chapter which he calls An Historical Journal of the Plague; but the information which it contains amounts to nothing at all. He confesses that he has had no experience in the complaint; that he has no remedy to offer for its cure, and no The treatment theory for its cause.* of the minor plague of Egypt, Ophthalmia, was precisely the method common in this country; and was generally attended with success, where the remedies were applied in time.

Nothing can be conceived more dreadful than was the situation of the military mission in the Turkish camp; exposed to a mutinous Turkish soldiery, to infection, famine, and a scene of the most abominable filth and putrefaction; and this they endured for a year and a half, with the patience of apostles of

One fact mentioned by Dr. Wittman appears to be curious;-that Constanti nople was nearly free from plague during the interruption of its communication with Egypt.

peace, rather than war. Their occupa- tent, and admonishes him, by these tion was to teach diseased barbarians, messengers, to a more pleasant exercise who despised them, and thought it no of his authority. That such severe small favour that they should be per-punishments should not confer a more mitted to exist in their neighbourhood. powerful authority, and give birth to a They had to witness the cruelties of better discipline, is less extraordinary, despotism, and the passions of armed if we reflect, that we hear only that the and ignorant multitudes; and all this punishments are severe, not that they embellished with the fair probability of are steady, and that they are just; for being swept off, in some grand en- if the Turkish soldiers were always gagement, by the superior tactics and punished with the same severity when activity of the enemy to whom the they were in fault, and never but then, Turks were opposed. To the filth, it is not in human nature to suppose irregularity, and tumult of a Turkish that the Turkish army would long camp, as it appeared to the British remain in as contemptible a state as it officers in 1800, it is curious to oppose now is. But the governed soon learn the picture of one drawn by Busbequius to distinguish between systematic in the middle of the sixteenth century: energy and the excesses of casual and "Turcæ in proximis campis tendebant; capricious cruelty; the one awes them cum vero in eo loco tribus mensibus into submission, the other rouses them vixerim, fuit mihi facultas videndorum to revenge. ipsorum castrorum, et cognoscendæ Dr. Wittman, in his chapter on the aliqua ex parte disciplinæ; qua de re Turkish army, attributes much of its misi pauca attingam, habeas fortasse degradation to the altered state of the quod me accuses. Sumpto habitu corps of Janissaries; the original conChristianis hominibus in illis locis stitution of which corps was certainly usitato, cum uno aut altero comite qua- both curious and wise. The children cunque vagabar ignotus: primum of Christians made prisoners in the videbam summo ordine cujusque cor- predatory incursions of the Turks, or poris milites suis locis distributos, et, procured in any other manner, were quod vix credat, qui nostratis militiæ exposed in the public markets at Conconsuetudinem novit, summum erat stantinople. Any farmer or artificer ubique silentium, summa quies, rixa was at liberty to take one into his sernulla, nallum cujusquam insolens fac-vice, contracting with government to tum: sed ne nox quidem aut vitulatio per lasciviam aut ebrietatem emissa. Ad hæc summa mundities, nulla sterquilinia, nulla purgamenta, nihil quod oculos ant nares offenderet. Quicquid est hujusmodi, ant defodiunt Turca, aut procul à conspectu submovent. Sed nec ullas compotationes aut convivia, nullum alex genus, magnum nostratis militiæ flagitium, videre erat: nulla lusoriarium chartarum, neque tesserarum damna norunt Turcæ." Augeri Busbequii, Epist. 3. p. 187. Hanoriæ. 1622. There is at present, in the Turkish army, a curious mixture of the severest despotism in the commander, and the most rebellious insolence in the soldier. When the soldier misbehaves, the Vizier cuts his head off, and places it under his arm. When the soldier is dissatisfied with the Vizier, he fires his ball through his

produce him again when he should be wanted; and in the meantime to feed and clothe him, and to educate him to such works of labour as are calculated to strengthen the body. As the Janissaries were killed off, the government drew upon this stock of hardy orphans for its levies; who, instead of hanging upon weeping parents at their departure, came eagerly to the camp, as the situation which they had always been taught to look upon as the theatre of their future glory, and towards which all their passions and affections had been bent, from their earliest years. Arrived at the camp, they received at first low pay, and performed menial offices for the little division of Janissaries to which they were attached: "Ad Gianizaros rescriptus primo meret menstruo stipendio, paulo plus minus, unius ducati cum dimidio. Id enim militi